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Hot Docs: The Defector tracks a harrowing escape from North Korea

Toronto filmmaker Ann Shin trusted her gut when teaming up with Dragon, a shadowy figure who ferries two North Korean women through China for her film The Defector: Escape from North Korea, having its world premiere at Hot Docs on Saturday.

“I didn’t know whether to trust him or not to trust him,” said Korean-Canadian Shin, a writer and award-winning producer and director for both TV and film. “I wasn’t afraid of him. I just didn’t know how to relate to him.”

Shin met Dragon — a man who fled North Korea in 2004, was caught and imprisoned for helping others get out — through defector Heo Tae-seop.

Heo, now living in Toronto, knew several “brokers,” those who help North Koreans escape the deplorable conditions in the dictatorship and start new lives, usually in South Korea.

Heo helped Shin make contact with that “vast network” of people aiding North Korean defectors, including Dragon, who has made good on his vow to find smarter ways to smuggle humans to freedom by bringing nearly 500 people out so far.

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The network was Shin’s original focus for the documentary. But that changed as she realized in order to tell the story properly, she needed to follow defectors on their journey.

“I found that every North Korean I spoke with had a burning desire to tell their story because they lived such incredible experiences,” said Shin. “They wanted to tell their stories but they wanted their identities concealed.”

Dragon, who calls himself a “broker or humanitarian,” is paid to help people who have already made it out of North Korea into China get safely through that country, where authorities deport defectors.

Shin joined Dragon and five defectors, eventually focusing on two: Sook-Ja and Yong-Hee. They explain their terrifying initial escape, crossing the icy Tumen River separating North Korea and northeast China. Dragon agreed to help them get out of China, handing them over to human smugglers who would guide them through Laos and into Thailand. Once in Thailand, they could get to South Korea.

“It’s jaw-dropping,” said Shin of the “tens of thousands” of North Koreans hiding in China, hoping to seek asylum or to find a way out of the country through Laos or via the more dangerous Gobi Desert-Mongolian route.

“It speaks to how desperate they are,” said Shin

Using hidden cameras, Shin filmed the long journey, chronicling the anxiety-fueled trip using both public transportation and private vehicles. If the women were caught, they’d be sent to a North Korean labour camp and their families would face punishment as well. But as one says, “even if I die trying, I want to get out of this country.”

As for Shin, her Canadian passport would protect her, although “if I got caught, I’d be questioned, detained and my footage would be confiscated.”

Dragon is hardly heroic throughout, as Shin and the defectors found. He lied to Shin from the beginning, assuring her that all five defectors would be happy to talk to her on camera.

“I arrived (in China) under cover of night and not only were they not content to be filmed, they didn’t even know I was coming. Dragon had lied to me,” she said. “There was a meal. We had chicken congee together. Dragon is a charmer. He told them I’m their older sister and he’s their older brother and the connections I have can help them. He just charmed them.”

Luckily, the defectors had heard of Canada and warmed to the Korean-speaking Shin. Soon they were on their way south.

“My opinions changed radically after this film and my opinion about Dragon changed four or five times,” said Shin. “I think that human smuggling is a necessary evil in this day and age. I wouldn’t even call it an evil. Governments and NGOs are failing whole groups of people. They are falling through the cracks.”

Shin said she hopes her film will help people understand more about North Korea while putting a human face on what defectors endure. Since Kim Jong-un’s appointment as leader, he has ordered even harsher crackdowns on escapees than his late father, Kim Jong-il. South Korean media reports in early 2012 said would-be defectors were being shot on sight by border guards.

Shin has included dramatic and disturbing images of the desperate conditions in the country taken by a North Korean cameraman who risked his safety to film with small camcorders and lipstick cams, smuggling the footage out for Shin’s use.

“The experience of being a North Korean is so foreign to most of the world,” Shin said. “I was hoping to make it very personal and just tell the story of a handful of North Koreans so people could relate to them on a personal level.”

To that end, Shin has also created a companion web project. The Defector Interactive is an immersive web experience using a videogame-like approach to let the user find out about life in North Korea and what it’s like to escape. Go to experience.thedefectormovie.com.

The Defector: Escape from North Korea screens April 27, April 29 and May 4 at Hot Docs. It will also air on TVO on June 26 at 9 p.m.

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